Confinement
by mysticxf
Summary: A painful memory resurfaces after the Others lock Kate in solitary.


Lost and its characters belong to JJ Abrams, Bad Robot and The Others. A painful memory resurfaces after the Others lock Kate in solitary.

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Lost – Confinement  
By Mystic  
June 16th 2006

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She hit the wall face first as the door slammed behind her and Kate turned quickly, her eyes shut tight against the pain. Her mouth pressed tighter around the gag in her mouth and she pulled at the ropes binding her hands together. When she opened her eyes, she sucked in a breath. The room was dark, no light coming through the spaces between the threads of her hood. Kate put her back to the wall and slid down against the ground.

She felt the ropes burn into her skin as she worked her hands past her bottom. Her thumb dislocated and she shouted, the sound muffled by her gag and she stopped, rolling on her side as her eyes started to tear up. Kate felt the cold floor through the hood and she felt the throbbing in her left hand a moment before rolling back over and bringing her hands up to that space underneath her knees. She wiggled back, pressing the back of her head into the wall.

"Fuck," she muttered, almost laughing at how innocuous it sounded with that gag in the way. Moving her arms around her legs, her right boot smacked her left thumb painfully before she had her hands in her lap, letting them sit there as she tried to catch her breath.

Pulling the hood off her head, she blinked at the darkness, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the room. It wasn't large, no larger than the armory closet back at the hatch, but there was no bed. Kate glanced down at her hands, put her left thumb into her right palm and then closed her fingers around it. She'd dislocated it before. It was the easiest way to get out of restraints, especially handcuffs.

Giving it a rough pull, she shouted, hearing it crack. Kate huffed, her fingers curling around the gag in her mouth and pulling it away so she could remove the ropes at her wrists.

When she was done, she sat, her chest rising and falling quickly, taking in the situation. The Others had captured them. Obviously thrown her into a room by herself. Probably did the same with Jack. With Sawyer. Kate frowned. They were 'home', that's what Henry said. She managed a huff of a laugh before pulling herself off the ground.

The only light in the room was a sliver of yellow coming from underneath the door. Kate pushed her right hand into the wall and walked a square around the room, trying to find anything she could use. A frame, some piece of concrete out of place she could break off, an old nail. She found the door, her hand testing the knob before she put her head against the cold surface and screamed in frustration.

Kate hated being locked in closets.

She'd tripped over the vacuum cleaner cord, the vacuum cleaner tipping over and smashing into the coffee table sending Wayne's dinner all over. Her mother gasped, the words "Dammit, Katherine!" escaping as Kate turned. She watched the woman's face drift towards Wayne who sat with a beer in one hand and his fork in the other. A splattering of mashed potatoes slowly dropping off his left cheek. His eyes opened and locked on hers as he stood. She started to back way, her head shaking as she shouted an apology.

"Wayne…" her mother's voice was soft and Kate watched her take a step towards them.

"She needs to cut this clumsy shit out, Diane. If she'd just learn to stand still…" he shook his head, his cheeks flustering.

Kate felt his hand grip like a vice around the back of her neck as he led her up the stairs. The man didn't say a word and Kate jerked away from him once, but his hand tightened painfully. She shouted another apology and he grunted in response, guiding her towards her bedroom. Her heart started to hammer. Going into a bedroom with Wayne meant you'd be screaming.

That's what her mother did.

He pushed her into her closet and closed the single accordion door shut. Kate backed into her clothes, stared at the blackness around her and she rushed forward, banging on the doors, pushing as hard as she could. "Let me out!" She shouted, panicked.

Wayne laughed. Kate froze. She heard his footsteps walk away from the door and just as she started to press at the center of the accordion doors, thinking this had been some cruel joke, the doors snapped back with a loud bang as he pressed the chair from her desk underneath the small knob on the outside. Locking her in. Kate shouted, banged and kicked and cried. Her board games fell with the force, pieces of Connect Four, Chess and Checkers smacking her arms and head.

"MOMMY!" She shrieked, her fists pounding into the door until it didn't hurt anymore. She collapsed onto the ground, her breathing labored and she closed her eyes trying to pretend she was anywhere else. It was a game she always played. Trying to forget she was here, pretending her mother didn't exist, Wayne didn't exist.

Her chest hurt and her mind went blank and when she opened her eyes again, the darkness made it harder to breathe. Suddenly she couldn't breathe at all. It was too dark and everything was on top of her. There were monsters in her closet and they tickled her neck and arms and she closed her eyes again, her lips making out words Tom had told her. "They're not real, they're not real. Monsters aren't real…" but her heart wasn't in it because Kate knew the truth.

Monsters were very real.

More real than anything else in her life. She put her hands on her eyes and she started to count. The numbers coming out in hushed breaths and she tried to inhale after each one. Somewhere around a hundred and eight, she fell asleep.

Shaking her head, Kate stared at the door in front of her, that creepy feeling that she wasn't alone making the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. She backed up slowly, her mind finding Jack's face as she started to count again, this time to five. Slowly, with each number she stopped and pulled in a long breath, fighting against her lungs, against the darkness.

"There are no monsters," she told herself out loud, quietly as her back pressed into the wall and she gripped the rope that had held her hands together only moments ago. "There are NO MONSTERS!" She shouted, feeling somewhat ridiculous. But the walls that had been closing in on her suddenly pulled away and she felt cooler air hit her face as she opened her eyes. She jumped and shouted, watching Henry stare at her where she sat, tied to a chair. Her body adjusted to the new setting and she looked around wildly. "How?" She asked him.

"All a construct of your mind, Kate," Henry offered with a grin.

Kate shook her head, confused. "What?"

"We need to learn all about you." He poked her with a needle and pushed a clear liquid into her vein as she struggled against the restraints. "Triggering memories through traumatic situations is the best way to learn about a person, about who they really are."

"How?" Kate groaned, feeling groggy as whatever he sent into her system took hold. Her eyes closed a second, but she felt him tap her left temple.

"The mind is a powerful tool, Kate, and, quite frankly, easily manipulated," he told her simply, watching her watch him. "Try counting, it seems to be a recurring theme in your life anyways, and it might make this easier."

She shook her head, but found herself doing just what he said, her eyes drifting shut even as she fought against it. Her head was starting to hurt and she could hear Wayne's voice drifting back into focus. It mingled with the voices of her mother, of Sam, of Sawyer and Jack and eventually they started to melt together until she didn't know who she was listening to anymore.

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Finis 


End file.
